McNeese State v. LSU - October 16, 2010 - My Thoughts

All week leading up to the McNeese State v. LSU game, I was reading where Coach Miles was warning the team not to take the Cowboys lightly.  

Well, I'm afraid that they did - to begin with.  I think that after a couple of series - specifically after McNeese State scored - first - to take the lead 7-0, that LSU "woke up".  It reminded me of the game with Tulane in the Superdome in the 2007 season where Tulane actually led LSU at halftime, then when they came out to start the second half, LSU took over the game and dominated the Green Wave and won - en route to winning the National Championship under Les Miles.  This is basically what happened then, too.

I think that when they got in the locker room at halftime, they were able to regroup and decided to try to get some pressure on the McNeese State QB.  They succeeded several times - and even got to him to the point of a couple of sacks.  

Then Kelvin Sheppard causing a fumble by McNeese State and recovering it for LSU lifted the Tigers.  Additionally, Derek Helton's trick play - pretending he was about to punt the ball and instead, seeing that the McNeese State defense wasn't coming after him, but was instead heading towards their end zone, pulled it down and tucked it and ran - gaining enough yardage to get LSU a first down - that had to buoy the Tigers too.

I saw a couple of instances where the referees blew calls - they penalized us a couple of times where it was questionable; then they "failed to see" an instance of tripping by McNeese State against Terrance Toliver and another instance of pass interference committed by McNeese State.  

Okay, LSU won the game 32-10 - by 22 points, when, once again, they should've blown McNeese State out - by 30 or 40 points.  They let McNeese State hang around until almost the end of the game - till the start of the fourth quarter, anyway.  

Our remaining games are:

Auburn
Alabama
UL-Monroe
Ole Miss
Arkansas

We do have an open date between Auburn and Alabama.  I consider all of these games to be of the "must win" variety.  The two SEC games that I believe are the most crucial "must win" are Alabama and Ole Miss.  Alabama - in order to beat Nicky Saban and Ole Miss - in order that I can tell the Rebel Black Bears fans around here to shut up!  We must dominate Ole Miss - not win in the final minute of the game - play like we did against Florida, but have the game in hand much earlier - like at the start of the fourth quarter!

LSU is 7-0 and 4-0 SEC.  The Tigers are 7-0 for the first time since 1973.  I'm not sure what their SEC Record in the 1973 season was at this same point in the season.  Obviously they would be undefeated in the SEC, but the question is how many of the first 7 games of the 1973 season had they played against SEC opponents.  I'll have to see if I can find that information out.  

Auburn is next week; the game is in Auburn, Alabama  and will be on CBS at 2:30 PM.  One thing's guaranteed about that game:  the Tigers will win - but the question is....which team of Tigers?

We'll see what happens....